No One's With the Calves

With the visual grandeur of a western, this film gives an eye-opening look at a farm in provincial north-eastern Germany.

The shimmering heat of summer spreads across an expanse of farmland somewhere between Berlin and Hamburg. Jan and his girlfriend Christin are to take over his parents’ farm; they’ve already mastered the routine. Christin stoically endures the hard work, but the question “What is your dream?” gets her off track and won't let go of her. With impressive precision, Sabrina Sarabi captures the bleakness of this daily work routine and allows her protagonist to think about her own aspirations. She gets closer and closer to her characters until they finally give free rein to their silent aggression. Lead actress Saskia Rosendahl gives her Christin’s forlornness a nervous energy in which a zest for life shines through beneath the routine and staidness.

Director